Suspect Discussion: Cresselia (Banned)

Discuss the possibility of banning Cresselia from the ORAS LU metagame.

Make sure you post intelligently based off of experience in the tier. Posts based off theorymon risk forum infractions.

Attempt to find the checks and counters (or lack thereof) for Cresselia as well as its impact and power in the metagame. Do not simply say "it's broken" or "it's not broken". Back up your arguments on why you think it should be banned or not.

Most importantly, elaborate on your points and try to think of counter arguments as you're posting. No one or two sentence posts will be allowed, and this will be strictly enforced.

If a consensus is reached, the result will likely be implemented in the metagame.

So, Cresselia has pretty ridiculous bulk, 120/120/130, which just lets it set up on stuff as it pleases. In return, its offensive stats are p bad (base 75 SpA) so it really needs some CM boosts to do stuff. Thats common sense, I won't bother with calc spam. If you really want to take down Cress you might need:

-Doublade, which doesn't give a shit about Psyshock and can just set up Swords Dance in Cress' face. The only problem is that it cannot take down Cress quickly:
+6 252+ Atk Doublade Shadow Sneak vs. 252 HP / 224+ Def Cresselia: 330-390 (74.3 - 87.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
If Cress happens to have Shadow Ball, there goes your check, as Doublade has no Sdef at all.

-Strong STAB SE attacks that can either KO on the special side before Cress sets up or can do heavy physical damage. But hey: Sharpedo and Honchkrow left, so all I can think of at the moment is...

Well, since no Dark-types really threaten Cress atm, it can afford to run Shadow Ball, leaving Escavalier the only thing that reliably kills it. And Esca doesn't have reliable recovery.

-Stall. Cress really wants to have its coverage, so you won't really run CM+Rest cress, and if you do it without Sleep Talk, you will be sitting there doing nothing for two turns, leaving Cress vulnerable. It CAN do that too, though, with its bulk. So, with the above set, Toxic kinda gets Cress after a while. Even at +6, some mons can tank Cress' attacks and stall it to death:
+6 0 SpA Cresselia Psyshock vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Porygon2: 139-165 (37.1 - 44.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

So yea, this thing has like one Pokemon that counters it in the tier now that the two prime Dark-types (Honchkrow and Sharpedo(-nite)) are gone and has absurd bulk so that it takes apart most things not named stall after a few boosts. The only drawbacks are its lacking power and Moonlight only having 8PPs, which aren't so severe considering the advantages Cress has. So seriously, this thing is broken. Get it out. Please.

Typing from phone so can't bring up calcs.
Cressy Mama has hefty 120/120/130 bulk. And with Mega Pedro and Honchkrow gone it a ridiculous shield of sorts.

As Krabby (@karkinos ) above stated, the only thing that really checks Cress is Doublade but only when Cress does not have Shadow Ball.. if Cress has Shadow Ball, Doublade is good as dead. Jolly Gallade at +2 doesn't OHKO it with Knock Off, neither does LO Adamant Hitmonlee KO if with the said move. And both are extremely vulnerable to Psyshock.
Banded Escavalier helps in killing it but having to run Escavalier in all our teams just for the sake of killing it isn't really fun.
Banded Emboar 2-3HKOs Cresselia with FBlitz but a psychic weakness + recoil from FBlitz doesn't mean it's a counter.
P2 for a defensive counter? LOL P2 is more of a setup fodder in front of Cress if you don't run Toxic (I don't :P)

As for looking on the other. If it doesn't get time to setup+moonlight it will benuked by strong special attackers or previously setup physical sweepers (Doublade says hello, So does Braviary running Shadow Claw)
It doesn't have reliable recovery (Moonlight-8PP) so that goes for a con. But tbrh its good features outweigh its bad feature so I call a BAN!

So, Cresselia has pretty ridiculous bulk, 120/120/130, which just lets it set up on stuff as it pleases. In return, its offensive stats are p bad (base 75 SpA) so it really needs some CM boosts to do stuff. Thats common sense, I won't bother with calc spam. If you really want to take down Cress you might need:

-Doublade, which doesn't give a shit about Psyshock and can just set up Swords Dance in Cress' face. The only problem is that it cannot take down Cress quickly:
+6 252+ Atk Doublade Shadow Sneak vs. 252 HP / 224+ Def Cresselia: 330-390 (74.3 - 87.8%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
If Cress happens to have Shadow Ball, there goes your check, as Doublade has no Sdef at all.

-Strong STAB SE attacks that can either KO on the special side before Cress sets up or can do heavy physical damage. But hey: Sharpedo and Honchkrow left, so all I can think of at the moment is...

Ok, first off, Ice Beam literally shouldn't be used on any set unless you really have such a weakness or fetish for killing Hippowdon or Steelix I guess through freezes. No Gligar to Toxic/Taunt Cress really means no need for Ice Beam when you can CM up on other things and use Shadow Ball/Moonblast.

Second, that set probably more like the 2nd or 3rd most viable set, there's a lot that can work against a CM + Moonlight with 2 attack set, that requires a hell of a lot of team support for Cress to come in and set up, and or stand alone it at the end. Removing all Taunt user, Set up boosters, and Toxic users, and not being Toxic'd nor Tricked previously. It's asking a hell of a lot from team support when you aren't using Substitute on the set. If I'd have to choose the potential best Cress set, it might actually be a team support in the form of:

Thunder Wave, always threatening vs offensive teams, Moonlight because it's a fat tank, Lunar Dance for offensive based teams really since you get a full on recovery of HP and PP and basically ignore any hazards that are up and might kill you if you were to normally switch in again, and obviously last move is to not be Taunt bait. I mean Lunar Dance really has a strong niche with the type of wallbreakers we actively have in the tier, and fails safes them back to full.

Both sets are really great though, and makes Cresselia a threat. CM is harder to pull off most times, but it can be it's own win condition vs stall teams easily and those without any boosters.

Well, since no Dark-types really threaten Cress atm, it can afford to run Shadow Ball, leaving Escavalier the only thing that reliably kills it. And Esca doesn't have reliable recovery.

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I introduce to you:

This beauty of a Poison/Dark Ogre hybrid Scorpion. Comes complete with Swords Dance, Taunt, Knock Off, great speed, and passable attack, despite having a lackluster Sp.Def, it basically resists any coverage move that Cresselia would run. Real beauty of a team support too. But, yeah it can run Shadow Ball, but there are many Dark types that threaten Cress without Moonblast called: Pangoro, Zoroark, Sharpedo (normal still exists), Scrafty, and I guess Malamar if you lack Thunder Wave or Moonblast.

Obviously Banded Crunch/KO is deadly. LO for those who want to have more of an option with power damage too, but I don't recommend LO Pangoro at all when Banded or AV would be better. Last one is basically AV version, and Crunch has a shot of lowering Defense, and you can pair it with KO for dual Dark Stab.

It gets both Swords Dance and Nasty Plot, making special and physical sets both viable in boosting. Especially with it's speed being amazingly fast, it becomes as serious threat that takes advantage of Cress w/o Moonblast.

This thing still is amazing, even without the Mega, it can even run a special set. However, you want to Crunch, which is standard itself. I mean special set Dark Pulse can 2hko, but if it gets a boost, it'll outlast you easily. But, that's on max/max+ Cress, Crunch is biting.

Cress uninvested or unboosted Moonblast 2hkos all those in the spoiler. It barely misses a 2hko on the SDef BU version of Scrafty, and like depending on a Malmar set can anywhere from 3HKO to 4-5HKO. Dark types are still very threatening to it. And all these are very viable on LU teams.

-Stall. Cress really wants to have its coverage, so you won't really run CM+Rest cress, and if you do it without Sleep Talk, you will be sitting there doing nothing for two turns, leaving Cress vulnerable. It CAN do that too, though, with its bulk. So, with the above set, Toxic kinda gets Cress after a while. Even at +6, some mons can tank Cress' attacks and stall it to death:
+6 0 SpA Cresselia Psyshock vs. 252 HP / 252+ Def Eviolite Porygon2: 139-165 (37.1 - 44.1%) -- guaranteed 3HKO

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That's pretty much the point with set up mons like this, is you can set up against stall to break them if it's required. Calm Mind, Bulk Up, Swords Dance, Nasty Plot, etc are there to break stall pokemon. Toxic/Burns, Phazing + Hazards are generally the only way stall handles pokemon like this. Cress of course says "HA" to hazards, which meaning it destroys stall a hell of a lot easier, so yeah, it's general point is that unless it doesn't run Substitute, it'll win vs Stall roughly 100% of the time.

Typing from phone so can't bring up calcs.
Cressy Mama has hefty 120/120/130 bulk. And with Mega Pedro and Honchkrow gone it a ridiculous shield of sorts.

As Krabby (@karkinos ) above stated, the only thing that really checks Cress is Doublade but only when Cress does not have Shadow Ball.. if Cress has Shadow Ball, Doublade is good as dead. Jolly Gallade at +2 doesn't OHKO it with Knock Off, neither does LO Adamant Hitmonlee KO if with the said move. And both are extremely vulnerable to Psyshock.
Banded Escavalier helps in killing it but having to run Escavalier in all our teams just for the sake of killing it isn't really fun.
Banded Emboar 2-3HKOs Cresselia with FBlitz but a psychic weakness + recoil from FBlitz doesn't mean it's a counter.
P2 for a defensive counter? LOL P2 is more of a setup fodder in front of Cress if you don't run Toxic (I don't :P)

As for looking on the other. If it doesn't get time to setup+moonlight it will benuked by strong special attackers or previously setup physical sweepers (Doublade says hello, So does Braviary running Shadow Claw)
It doesn't have reliable recovery (Moonlight-8PP) so that goes for a con. But tbrh its good features outweigh its bad feature so I call a BAN!

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So, they have to be able to OHKO for Cress to not be broken? There's honestly a fair amount of workable check type pokemon that hinder Cress, because it requires figuring out what the Cress is working. But, Jolly +2 Gallade is doing 64-76%, and the winner is basically is Gallade switching into Cress, vice-versa (if one has to switch into the other on a SD vs CM set up, the one switching in loses). Gallade isn't just limited to SD sets though, I think it might be the best one, but there's Trick Gallade, Bulky Bulk Up Gallade, comes down to the Cress set and what coverage move(s) it's running.

Sending a Hitmonlee on a Cress isn't the smartest idea either, because obvious reasons, but yeah CB/LO KO only doing about 47-55% is disappointing, but Lee has no offensive boosting potential against any fat walls, just its lucky enough that any general fat wall isn't gonna stand for a Reckless boosted STAB HJK.

Also, Crush Claw on Braviary is probably a better way to win because it has a 50% chance of dropping Defense.

You don't need Escavalier (banded or AV) on every team to beat Cress. You honestly need to play smart mostly is easily the first answer. The second is integrating multi-purpose Pokemon that give Cresselia trouble.

Cress literally is the devil. It is the Fat Moon Duck Princess the devil sent to us to be almost unkillable by any standards in every single tier we have. That's what its niche exactly is, be a fat tank that can status a team, and you normally need a full force Specs, Banded hit, Booster, Toxic user, Taunt, or Trick user to mess with it. It is designed that you have to have the strongest hitter in a tier with like STAB and Super Effective hitting it to actually even think of 1 -2HKO'ing it naturally.

Cress has multiple sets some that don't actually even see use or thought, but here's the basic of this Chubby Moon Princess:

Something along those lines usually. First two obviously just maximize the hell out of its physical bulk, where you'd boost up the SpDef and try to sweep or do damage. Depending on your coverage there are multiple ways to actually subdue a CM set of Cresselia. First off, solitary Psychic move Cress is completely walled by Dark types, so you kind of do need Moonblast, which is basically walled by Steels since Poisons would fear Psychic coverage. So yeah, first flag there goes to its generally a stand alone win condition so the entire team has to remove anything that threatens it's one coverage move generally. Not running Sub means that you are Toxic bait then, which is viable on multiple pokemon too. Porygon2, Golbat (infiltrator hits up on sub anyway), Vaporeon, some Jellicent versions, Seismitoad, generally bulky stuff, so you have to play caution with possible Sub sets. Trick sets also entirely mess Cresselia up when Subs not up, and with them not entirely being common that much anymore, it's a great surprise way of cripping a cress (same for other bulkier support mons). Though people want a sure fire way, Taunt pokemon. Drapion and Froslass are primer Taunt users with team support, and it's a widely distributed move that with the amount of "support" category moves being around, can be entirely beneficial to some pokemon sets to stop healing or setting up hazards. Qwilfish, Jellicent, Cobalion, Stunktank, M-Banette. The worst you'd have to fear on these, is that you'll run into a Magic Coat using Cresselia just to laugh at you trying to use Taunt/Toxic on it over say CM or an attack/sub move.

The last set basically outspeeds up to max speed Exploud which if you get a +1 up, lol it's not gonna break you, so yeah +1 SpDef vs special wallbreakers,not gonna win unless you can boost against it.

Basically offensive team support, which is probably the more threatening set. T-Wave of course means that your speed is cut, and you have a 1 in 4 chance of not being able to move. Which against a bulky as heck tank like Cress means it's getting free recovery and hits. Obviously Moonblast hits dark types that'd threaten you, Psychic move hits other stuff like Fighting types. Final move helps out offenses with Lunar Dance recovering the entire HP and PP of a mon, and you ignore the hazards as it switches in, so you get basically a free switch in on 1 pokemon. Magic Coat is just to laugh at trying to stop it having team support with Taunt, and stop hazards from setting up, and bouncing them back. Not much that can stop the T-Wave set except Taunt, as the various Ground and Electric types aren't gonna be overpowering Cress anytime soon, unless we see the advent of NP Raichu more often or SD Sandslash with some speed (not recommended ever in LU). You pretty much would have to Toxic and even then Magic Coat or it using Lunar Dance as it dies, since you basically will get Crippled trying to overpower it in one hit, since there's no doing it without some set up.

Dual Screens honestly has an advent to use, but it's a lesser set obviously. But, we have multiple wallbreakers and boosting pokemon that would love having Screen Support, and Cress can give both since again it's fat. There's nothing more to it, just support a team with screens and let them go and boost. Taunt + Toxic is the way to stop Cress, Taunt + Phazing is how you'd take care of the boosters, and if they are wallbreakers, you'll have to hope you have a bulkier team that can counter or outlast their onslaught.

That's pretty much Cress in a nutshell. It's one of the more bullshit Pokemon you might find in any tier, as given even a turn of boosting it is near impossible to break if it has the right move coverage with its healing capabilities. The chances of it being 2hko by most common pokemon in any tier are highly slim, and even then you need the boost of LO, Band, or Specs in order to achieve it, or combine it with boosting moves to get close to a OHKO. It's one that's almost always gonna be slimly 3HKO'd or 4hko'd more likely by weaker mons. Part of me is inclined to think a ban is healthier for the tier, but that also feels biased on my part because I know how much of a Fat Moon Duck Cress and no one wants to play against a Cresselia which isn't my job here, and my job here is to dissect what Cress does, what it does against, and what can actually beat it in battle. So, for now I'm not entirely sure what to think on Cress without further testing on my part at least.

EDIT: was that your 1000th message? :o@Celestial Phantom, nice way of showing new perspectives. My two cents on that:

I have never used the support set, so I can't say much to that one anyway. What I do know is that even teams dedicated to stopping CM cress got their ass kicked as high as UU (I didn't want to use Drapion...well, that doesn't mean much, I'm just bad ;)). Well, Drapion sure is a counter to Cresselia, point taken. But hey: I don't want to use a NU mon that is weak to very common LU mons (Nidoqueen? Hippo? Flygon? Steelix?) just for the sake of taking care of Cresselia. You say its beautiful team support, but I don't see why we should propel a NU mons usage just because of Cress (I hate the word centralizing).

That's pretty much the point with set up mons like this, is you can set up against stall to break them if it's required.

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Well, that only works if you happen to run Substitute, as you explained yourself. And you really hate losing that coverage. Speaking of coverage, what takes care of Cresselia really comes down to the question what coverage Cress is even running. I'd hate to call Scrafty or Pangoro anything more than a shaky check in that sense. Zoroark and Sharpedo are all nice, but Sharpedo also dies if Cress has Moonblast and it carries a LO. If it does run Moonblast, however, Doublade eats it up.

So, what it really comes down to if you want to stop a CM set is running Drapion or Escavalier or hoping that it doesn't carry the right coverage. If you run something like Offense, you probably wouldn't want to run Toxic (hope it doesn't have sub~~) on anything, so you are left with two counters and a few somewhat shaky checks (some of which are NU, thus their viability is questionable. Don't get me wrong - I use Scrafty myself, but...). I am well aware that "no checks/counters =/= broken", but its lack of real hard counters comes merely from the fact that its damn bulky and has options on what to run to break checks. This ability to "pick checks/counters" also does not break a mon (Lando-I and MegaGross say hi) in my opinion, but Cresselia just threatens a whole damn playstyle, given the fact it is used by a person with some ability with its bulk and setup opportunities.

Yeah, there's really not much to say about Cress. Defensive sets are pretty average and do just about as well as porygon2 in the walling business. With the abundance of Escavalier and some of the criminally underused dark types support cress really just sits there for a minute passing status to one or two mons then lunar dances to something. Very underwhelming.

But we all know that offensive Cress is insane and the reason why we're reading this thread.

Yes, all those dark types are very nice to look at, and skuntank/drapion certainly have cress' number. Literally every other named dark type on celestial's list loses to CM Cress. I don't know why people stress Moonlight on these sets so much as you literally do not need it; 95% of the walls in the tier are your set up fodder with substitute, and with that first calm mind only banded knock offs or mega horns are going to break you in one shot.

After all, +1 moonblast kills zoroark and sharpedo while both fail to do 70% unless choiced. Even then honestly zoroark isn't a check since it does right around 50% to a +1 Cress with a specs dark pulse. Mixed attacker can do around 61% with knock off which is comparable to anything else not choiced. Pangoro dies to +1 moonblast, can't out speed and scrafty has no chance of overpowering Cresselia.

We pretty much have the only ironclad check and counters in doublade and Escavalier/drapion/skuntank respectively. Doublade sets up on every non-shadow ball cress while the other 3 soundly beats any respectable Cress set you'll see, since HP Fire just gimps you harder than the payout it brings. Other checks largely revolve around pressuring Cress with the rest of its team to not set up that substitute or +1 boost, and to be frank that's pretty close to impossible unless one of those 3 are there.

CM Cress won't always bring home the bread, but it'll take out at least 2 of the things trying to stop it while attempting to do so. It's not invincible, however make no mistake; a well played cress is far too dominating to allow it to stay in the tier.

EDIT: was that your 1000th message? :o@Celestial Phantom, nice way of showing new perspectives. My two cents on that:

I have never used the support set, so I can't say much to that one anyway. What I do know is that even teams dedicated to stopping CM cress got their ass kicked as high as UU (I didn't want to use Drapion...well, that doesn't mean much, I'm just bad ;)). Well, Drapion sure is a counter to Cresselia, point taken. But hey: I don't want to use a NU mon that is weak to very common LU mons (Nidoqueen? Hippo? Flygon? Steelix?) just for the sake of taking care of Cresselia. You say its beautiful team support, but I don't see why we should propel a NU mons usage just because of Cress (I hate the word centralizing).

Well, that only works if you happen to run Substitute, as you explained yourself. And you really hate losing that coverage. Speaking of coverage, what takes care of Cresselia really comes down to the question what coverage Cress is even running. I'd hate to call Scrafty or Pangoro anything more than a shaky check in that sense. Zoroark and Sharpedo are all nice, but Sharpedo also dies if Cress has Moonblast and it carries a LO. If it does run Moonblast, however, Doublade eats it up.

So, what it really comes down to if you want to stop a CM set is running Drapion or Escavalier or hoping that it doesn't carry the right coverage. If you run something like Offense, you probably wouldn't want to run Toxic (hope it doesn't have sub~~) on anything, so you are left with two counters and a few somewhat shaky checks (some of which are NU, thus their viability is questionable. Don't get me wrong - I use Scrafty myself, but...). I am well aware that "no checks/counters =/= broken", but its lack of real hard counters comes merely from the fact that its damn bulky and has options on what to run to break checks. This ability to "pick checks/counters" also does not break a mon (Lando-I and MegaGross say hi) in my opinion, but Cresselia just threatens a whole damn playstyle, given the fact it is used by a person with some ability with its bulk and setup opportunities.

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Yes that was my 1000th message, I wasted it on replying to you guys, because I like doing this. I should use my 1000th and something post soon and post an epic ballad of robots, ninjas, and totoro in a quest to save the world of PO, despite the fact that overlord Professor Oak will eventually infract me for retarded Topic's because he's a cranky old man, y/y/n/br?

Anyway, a Pokemon's tier listing honestly holds nothing on how good it actually might be as a Pokemon on a team in a tier above. Starmie was LU for so long, it was a surprise we had it for so long, because it still honestly is fricking good. As well, a lot of NU pokemon are able to merge well into LU teams, if they fit a need. Just because Drapion is NU doesn't mean you should look down on it, just because NU. Sure it won't ever beat Hippo or Steelix or probably most offensive Flygon versions, but hey unless you see pretty much a max hp and def+ nidoqueen, SD EQ Drapion wins vs a Nidoqueen. The point of this stuff is to open the idea of using things people might not think, and its our jobs to find ways to see how viable they are and support them. You always have to find a way to add supports for things your team is weak to, just because it's in the tier below doesn't mean you are allowed to just knock it. That's literally how metagame changes work, because pokemon in lower tiers might find some viable usage in higher tiers because they take on certain threats.

Now onto your other half of the post, I mean let's face it in every tier barring Ubers really, Cress absorbs hits. OU has things that just hit freakishly hard, so Cress isn't viable there obviously. UU hits less hard, and Cress actually does wall a fair amount of the physical and some of the special pokemon unless they be rocking their Specs and Bands usually or a few cases of LO or boosts. But, an offensive set really doesn't work there, so I guess it's just bulk support. Getting down to here is really hitting the line now, where the power gap is limited, and even with those items some pokemon just don't hit as hard as liked, but still are completely functional as a match goes on. Cress and probably Porygon2 are the definitions on drawing the lines in the sand where power will or won't work. Also as far as it goes on "threatens a whole playstyle" meaning Stall I'd assume, I can name you a good 5-10 pokemon with sets that can threaten it as a whole, granted they don't possibly give the other playstyles a large amount of trouble due to the possibility of support.

Yeah, there's really not much to say about Cress. Defensive sets are pretty average and do just about as well as porygon2 in the walling business. With the abundance of Escavalier and some of the criminally underused dark types support cress really just sits there for a minute passing status to one or two mons then lunar dances to something. Very underwhelming.

But we all know that offensive Cress is insane and the reason why we're reading this thread.

Yes, all those dark types are very nice to look at, and skuntank/drapion certainly have cress' number. Literally every other named dark type on celestial's list loses to CM Cress. I don't know why people stress Moonlight on these sets so much as you literally do not need it; 95% of the walls in the tier are your set up fodder with substitute, and with that first calm mind only banded knock offs or mega horns are going to break you in one shot.

After all, +1 moonblast kills zoroark and sharpedo while both fail to do 70% unless choiced. Even then honestly zoroark isn't a check since it does right around 50% to a +1 Cress with a specs dark pulse. Mixed attacker can do around 61% with knock off which is comparable to anything else not choiced. Pangoro dies to +1 moonblast, can't out speed and scrafty has no chance of overpowering Cresselia.

We pretty much have the only ironclad check and counters in doublade and Escavalier/drapion/skuntank respectively. Doublade sets up on every non-shadow ball cress while the other 3 soundly beats any respectable Cress set you'll see, since HP Fire just gimps you harder than the payout it brings. Other checks largely revolve around pressuring Cress with the rest of its team to not set up that substitute or +1 boost, and to be frank that's pretty close to impossible unless one of those 3 are there.

CM Cress won't always bring home the bread, but it'll take out at least 2 of the things trying to stop it while attempting to do so. It's not invincible, however make no mistake; a well played cress is far too dominating to allow it to stay in the tier.

PS: Cress doesn't need LO, just use sub+2 attacks with CM.

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Honestly, Pnerd, I hadn't really give that one some though. I mean defensive sets are annoying, but the offensive one I've kind of let slip off my mind.

# 7 - 4.32 % (19 battles)
Cresselia @ Leftovers Lv. 100 -- Levitate

Nature: Bold - EVs: 252 HP / 252 Def (100.0 %)

Psychic

Substitute

Calm Mind

Moonblast

This is probably why, because it's not used in many battles. But, 2 attacks with SubCM especially with S-Ball and Moonblast over the less needed Psyshock (which would be for other CM'ers I guess, Meloetta and the like, as well as a few Poison types I guess.) Since Moonblast does hit fighting types, Shadow Ball gets your Doublade check. That would leave very few checks in Escavalier, Drapion, Skuntank, LORD DURANT partially. There are 3 extra threats to subCM though, very big ones you left off, but 1 is literally shaky as hell because it might die trying to do something being: LORD YANMEGA, Exploud, and Venomoth. Obviously Yanmega vs Cress brings back some really old BW RU memories for me playing for a while where Yanmega wrecked everything even Cress, which it still does now. Depending on the speed set of Cress and Exploud, Specs Exploud can win even with a if it gets a hit on unboosted Cress, literally only way is getting a unboosted then hitting it again. Lack of actual recovery for cress on a set like this helps Exploud though. Venomoth has Bug Buzz which on for unboosted can do a lot, but SR weak and Psyshock possibly means you die.

While I myself is still on the fence about Cress, there's a few thing I'd like to point out.

Focusing on Calcs provided by CP, avoiding ohko after rocks from Choice Band Pangoro knock off is pretty insane, which is the strongest dark type move in the tier boosted by Choice band. In fact, our fat duck princess can use moonlight on the turn opponent uses knock off, run away, come back later on the large part of the meta which it walls and beat pangoro. See, unlike other pokemon, u need a stab super effective hard hitter to do anything to Cress, and still then its not guaranteed to work. I mean, Cress has 5 other team mates, there is absolutely no reason why cress has to be able to deal with these things. .

I see Cress is being compared to Porygon-2, which is quite reasonable imo. But there's one significant difference between Cress and Porygon2. While Pory is not weak to knock off and Cress is, Pory gets crippled by stray knock offs by say Shuckle. Pory's walling capability gets highly diminished for the rest of the match. Cress on the other hand takes for example Hitmonlee's knock off like nothing. Plus Pory itself might be broken, though that's a discussion for another day.

One of the reason why Cress does not do as well in higher tiers is because of the fact that it's a huge taunt bait. From the on and off experience I have of LU, I gotta say LU really lacks in this department. Yeah, qwilfish and cobalion carries taunt, and we all know how much they actually threaten Cress.

As Aurist and Celes are already aware I think, I see only one direction with Cress, I think it's extremely disgusting and far too good for LU.

You can argue Psychic is a shit defensive type until you're blue in the face and it doesn't change the fact that I already agree with you and that it doesn't matter for Cress. Fact is Cress is a single-type Pokémon with 120/120/130 defenses. It has no dual weaknesses to exploit and with those defenses that's all its typing needs to do for it. I mean sure if it was Poison-type it'd have one weakness and be immune to Toxic, and that would be cool. But Psychic is good enough for Cress imo. It gives it resistances to Fighting and other Psychic attacks, which is useful.

Cress's defenses are such that a neutral hit is unlikely to be able to hurt it much. Unless it's really really strong and on Cress' uninvested defense.
252+ SpA Choice Specs Adaptability Dragalge Draco Meteor vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Cresselia: 304-358 (68.4 - 80.6%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252+ SpA Choice Specs Exploud Boomburst vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Cresselia: 235-277 (52.9 - 62.3%) -- 99.6% chance to 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
252 SpA Choice Specs Yanmega Bug Buzz vs. 252 HP / 4 SpD Cresselia: 324-384 (72.9 - 86.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO after Leftovers recovery
Knowing that you need powerful hits like these to 2KO cress on its uninvested defensive side (and in Dragal's case not because it's Dmeteor and it's outsped) you might want to think what does actually KO it in one shot. Well the answer is almost nothing and certainly nothing in LU unboosted (except CB Escav's Megahorn). So we have come to a point where the best LU's strongest attacks, on its weaker defense can't 2KO it. Now that would be fine if Cress were something akin to Shuckle, with 0 offensive presence, no recovery and even less capacity to sweep. But that's not the case. Cress has Calm Mind and Moonlight. If it wants to it can sweep. SubCM Cress will sweep stall all day, the only salvations being Encore or Dark-types if it's mono-attacking (and that it can't recover properly if it's not mono-attacking). I'm not saying Cress is an instant offensive monster because it's not. 75 SpA is pretty bad, especially when you're uninvested, but it really doesn't need to be one.

Against offense cress has a harder time, it can't just sweep on anything because it doesn't like Taunt or Encore or Toxic or even some strong attacks like Boomburst. But it can always find a way because it is bulky enough to set up on something in a natural team and we can't all run Escav and even those who can can't all keep it healthy with its no recovery and tendency to want to switch in a lot.

Checks and counters probably your best bets are Rest/AV Escav and Taunt/Encore/Toxic.

I feel like I didn't wrap this up properly so just read the first line again and call that an ending.

Overall, when you look at it, Cress isn't all that spectacular in your average playing of Pokemon. It's not strong, and you are basically going to do chip damage with it in most cases, unless you fight a team full of bantum weight pokemon, with no real offensive streaks, in which case, congrats you will lose to Cresselia and its walling ability. However, it in itself is an amazing team support and wall for many styles. With 120/120/130 bulk, it requires tremendous effort to even attempt to break it, usually requiring multiple Pokemon to do so. Supporting offensive teams with Thunder Wave, or supporting Defensive teams with Toxic stalling potential, as well as giving support in the form of Lunar Dance when it is close to death is amazing help. Almost any pokemon fighting against it will come out significantly weaker from the exchange except for most bulk/slow steel types. Cresselia itself doesn't actually do a whole lot in most competitive matches except what it excels at which is tanking and forcing passive damage/switches to breaker types. Set up wise, with access to Calm Mind, many special breakers fail to even solidly 2HKO it after just 1 Calm Mind. Conversely the types that give it the most trouble which are Dark types usually, as well as Ghost types, can fear its access to Moonblast and Shadow Ball to cause major damage even unboosted.

As such, due to its overwhelming ability to functionally support a team and lack credible checks, counters, and tactics to actually work against it, Cresselia will be Banned from ORAS LU.